Thursday, February 19, 2015

Beautiful Ciak Journals

While living in England I got hip to quite a few of the little treasures Europe had to offer. And right before my trip to Italy (Actually, while I was researching the trip) I found out about Ciak journals- and I fell in love.

Do you ever get that feeling of loving a notebook so much that you can't even write in it? That would be my relationship with Ciak. It's funny because, after I discovered them, I went to Italy, got lost, and found myself in a store full of them. Kismet much?

The cover is a brilliant pink color, but they have so many to choose from- yellows, oranges, and greens being my favorites. It feels buttery smooth to the touch and has a flexible yet durable texture. There are 224 pages in this baby. And we all know Italian leather is the best! They also use eco-friendly acid free paper. Double score.

I'm gonna be honest, I just want to curl up in bed with this thing. As a side note, I am currently in bed watching some God awful movie on Amazon with my Fire Stick. Let me tell you, amazing is WINNING with this fire stick situation!!! Hashtag MOVIESEVERYWHERE! (yes, I spelled out #)

The elastic comes out of the spine and is tightly secured in a tiny notch in the cover. The Prices range from $15- 25 USD but I originally paid in pounds so I'm not sure exactly how much it was. The elastic is very thick and it is extremely more durable than the moleskine's.

You can see the small notch in the picture below. The biggest design flaw with this notebook is the fact that it doesn't lay flat. There is a gap between the spine and the pages and this causes the notebook to rise from the table. I'm not a fan of this. I guess I could get all bendy and ruin it, but I don't think my soul will let me.

My favorite part- the paper. This is very high quality "Ivory" paper, or at least that's what they say in the description. After using my Spanish to try to navigate the Italian website, and finding that I'd made a horrible mistake because they are in no way connected, I did some internet hopping and found that the paper is 110 gsm. And....

It takes fountain pen ink brilliantly! I mean, my pen absolutely glides across the page. That is my single favorite thing about the Ciak. I wish I could find a midori insert that took ink as well as this. Hmmmm maybe that's my next mission in live. Can I find a cahier with this kind of amazing paper- ohhhh with graph paper. Mission accepted!